Chapter 107 Amber Snail You saw the ashes of a god, a withered...
Du Yu's heart skipped a beat. He looked up, about to ask a question, when he saw the woman in front of him, who had been wary, suddenly look up in a daze. Her entire attention was captured by a point that did not exist in the void. In her trembling pupils, the seed of fear sprouted, grew against the wind, and stretched its branches and leaves wantonly.
The woman's expression suddenly calmed down, as if she had glimpsed an eternal truth in a brief pause and gladly accepted her fate. She even had time to cast an apologetic glance at Du Yu.
Then--
Du Yu's outstretched hand suddenly froze, his fingertips slightly bent, futilely trying to hold onto the air. He had just been standing here, cautiously and mercenarily surveying the women around him, but under that strange gaze, he suddenly collapsed, like a paper doll that had burned out, turning to ashes in an instant.
"Bang."
Under Du Yu's astonished gaze, the backpack that had fallen to the ground rolled a few times on its own, and the zipper suddenly opened with a "whoosh," like a wide-open mouth.
The woman's wary expression was still vivid in his mind's eye. He tightened his clenched hands, making sure there was nothing amiss with the sleeping body, before taking out a pair of large gloves and tentatively picking up the bag.
It seemed that the previous action had exhausted all the backpack's energy, or perhaps the newly synthesized [Cursed Flying] gloves had played a role. Du Yu cautiously took out the items from the backpack, but nothing happened.
A crumpled piece of brown paper.
The outermost layer of the paper ball was exactly the same as the kraft paper that Du Yu often saw. Du Yu could even pick out a few black spots in the texture of the paper.
Du Yu gently shook the crumpled paper in his hand. Finding nothing amiss, he carefully unfolded the paper, instinctively holding his breath.
"The ashes of a god"—a god is already a non-human being. Before falling into slumber, Du Yu's true form had already become highly energized, without even bones, so how could she have ashes? But when Du Yu opened the crumpled paper, all doubts vanished, and a mysterious feeling swept over her. Her eyes, ears, nose—all her senses were telling her that these were indeed the ashes of a god.
—A piece of amber the size of a fist.
In the center of the bright yellow transparent crystal, a white-pink snail-shaped creature rests quietly. Every wrinkle on the surface of its soft tissue is clearly visible, as if it is just sleeping there and may continue to crawl at any time.
Du Yu's gaze swept over the snail's tentacles, preserved in amber. Inspiration struck her like lightning, and she murmured a name:
White jade snail, a mollusc belonging to the order Stylomata, class Gastropoda*.
"...[lost his mind and his senses]."
With a whoosh, Du Yu seemed to hear the sound of a six-winged white dove flapping its wings again. The familiar system notification sound rang out, and although the tone was no different from usual, Du Yu inexplicably detected a hint of sadness in it.
You saw the ashes of a god, a withered seed.
The so-called "ashes of the gods" are the elemental seeds that failed to "germinate".
Although it was unexpected, upon closer reflection it makes perfect sense.
The germination of a seed signifies the birth of a new god, while the withering of a seed naturally corresponds to the death of a god.
If my intuition is correct, what Du Yu holds should be the seed of the evil god [Losing Heart and Eyes] that Mao Hu Zi and the others saw in their dreams.
When a deity dies, the seeds wither and fall back into the soil, nourishing all things. The ashes of a deity can nurture new seeds.
The system was unusually generous, pausing for a moment before uttering a long explanation about "divine ashes." Du Yu, however, keenly caught the trap the system had left: "Seeds for nurturing new life? Only by obtaining the ashes of a god can one successfully obtain the elemental seed?"
The system remained silent. Du Yu, having figured out the crux of the matter, gritted his teeth inwardly. The tasks this system issued were getting increasingly cunning; not only were the task names censored, but even the key items weren't revealed beforehand. If Du Yu had just let this woman leave, where was she going to find another god's ashes?
Du Yu carefully picked up the amber, tried it out, and successfully put it into his game inventory. The storage slot, which could normally hold 99 of the same type of material, now displayed "Withered Element Seed *1 (Cannot be stacked)".
Without the amber covering it, the writing on the crumpled kraft paper became visible.
"When a fisherman casts his bait, he may catch a big fish, but he also risks being dragged and falling into the water. The same is true for the fish; the moment they decide to swallow the bait, the battle between predator and prey has already begun."
"A newly born god, what will you choose?"
"—Respectfully submitted by You Shi"
Yuuto...!
Du Yu's first reaction was that the Lord of the Pure Sea had come to her, but that was not surprising. What secrets could exist in front of a god who controlled the element of destiny?
Instead of launching a direct attack, the enemy sent You Shi with the "ashes" of [Shi Xin Bing Mu], which served as both bait and a provocation.
There is only one path to godhood, and the Lord of the Pure Sea is clearly well aware of her movements.
But His control over fate must also be limited, otherwise she should have been able to see You Shi, who was sent by the [Lord of the Pure Sea], greeting her on the first day of her transmigration.
Can the fog prevent Him from spying?
Thinking of the divine kingdom shrouded in gray mist, a thoughtful look flashed in Du Yu's eyes. She had been active for so long, and it was only in the lower city that the other party had come knocking on her door.
As long as it's not a true physical attack that uses a dimensional reduction technique, Du Yu is confident he can handle the situation.
Hunting is a battle between two sides, and even those who sit back and relax can capsize. Du Yu recalled the woman's terrified eyes before she disappeared, and a chill ran through him.
Let's meet in the Upper District then.
——
"Are you really going to do this? Let's think about it some more; maybe we can come up with another way to get into the upper city..."
A meeting room in a redwood church.
Xiao Yi stood by the wall, holding a sign helplessly. Cat Whiskers stood on a chair, enthusiastically directing him to adjust the angle and trying to manage the model's expression: "Hey, smile! We're taking pictures later, be cheerful!"
Du Yu raised her wrist, and the personal computer with the camera module lit up. She took a few steps back to adjust the angle and offered a different opinion from Cat Whiskers: "No, this photo is for a promotional poster. Xiao Yi, you need to be more serious. You can smile a little, but not too much."
"Click".
Two conflicting opinions swirled in her ears. Xiao Yi looked up in confusion, her pupils unfocused, her expression blank, her lips unconsciously pursed, and her upper eyelids slightly closed due to the movement of looking up, giving off a cold and disdainful air.
Even though Tian Yinuo could tell at a glance that Xiao Yi was spacing out again, this expression was enough to deal with outsiders.
Du Yu magnified and carefully examined the photo, nodded in satisfaction, sent Xiao Yi to eat, and opened the photo editing software to start creating.
Just now, in order to take the photo, Du Yu didn't turn on the privacy mode. Cai Chunyu, who was next to him, immediately noticed the text added to the photo on the screen and said with a headache:
“‘Unconditionally release the rebel leader,’ ‘Corporates | Parasites of the city,’ ‘We need real freedom’… If you hold up this poster in the lower city, a sheriff will come knocking on your door in less than three seconds.”
Isn't this perfect?
After making sure the entire photo, except for the face, was surrounded by bold, large text, Du Yu stopped with satisfaction and turned to look at Cai Chunyu, who seemed hesitant to speak: "Didn't you tell me that without identification, going to jail is the only quick way to get into the Upper City?"
From Du Yu's perspective, the entire City of the Sun is like a giant fried egg, with districts 01 to 06 arranged outwards from the center.
From districts 01 and 02, which are outside of the Upper District, not only does the level of prosperity decrease sequentially, but the level of security also declines accordingly.
Entering District 06, also known as the Lower District, is as easy as using your legs.
Starting from District 05, entry not only requires verification, but also incurs clean air usage fees and private area stay fees based on the length of stay. According to Dong Shiwu's recollection, an average worker in the lower district earns between 20 and 25 credits per hour. In District 03, a stay on a regular street costs as much as 15 credits per hour.
Even in the higher-income districts 03, 04, and 05, residents rarely appear in other areas, except for companies and apartments that do not charge extra stay fees.
Needless to say, in districts 01 and 02, the stay fee is meaningless because almost all areas are divided up by a few major conglomerates, and it is impossible to enter without internal permission.
The Upper City not only has a hundred-meter-high city wall to prevent smuggling, but there is also a protective shield in the corresponding spirit realm area, which caused the weaker Little Evil God to fail.
Therefore, ordinary people from other districts who want to enter the Upper Town not only need a clean criminal record, but also need a permit specially approved by a certain conglomerate or the council.
Unfortunately, they all failed the identity verification process at the very first stage.
All the files of the City of the Sun are controlled by the central AI Yuanfu. If anyone present could hack into them, they wouldn't be here; they would have been in the research institute long ago.
After returning from the recycling company, Du Yu sought out the two sisters, Kou Qingyi and Kou Qingman, who were the only two believers who could be considered highly educated. The two women, who had received higher education in biology, spent a long time struggling through programming tutorials before telling Du Yu that it was like crossing a mountain when you were in a different field, and they really couldn't solve the problem.
Du Yu had to find another way, but the Lower City was full of talented people. Over the years, all the easy loopholes had already been exploited and thoroughly patched up. In the end, it was a joke played by Cat Whiskers that gave Du Yu an idea:
"The fastest way to get to the Upper City? Go to jail, of course. Cross Prison is in the Upper City."
Of course, the prison that Cat Whiskers was talking about was not an ordinary prison.
Cross Prison is a special prison for superhumans who are high-risk criminals. It is personally guarded by Christina, the head of the Security Bureau. Once you are imprisoned there, you basically have no chance of seeing the light of day again.
Naturally, the City of the Sun doesn't support idlers, and the Cross Prison won't keep these prisoners for nothing. In addition to the exorbitant amount of credits, they also need to complete various tasks issued by the prison to earn points in order to obtain enough funds to survive in the prison.
Since they were all in prison, the tasks assigned to them naturally didn't take into account the prisoners' human rights. Not only were they all highly dangerous, but most of them were also assigned by the tycoons, tasks that even they found difficult to handle. Many prisoners died there before they reached the end of their sentences.
According to Cat Beard, there isn't enough free labor. Now, any superhuman with B-level or higher who commits a crime will be dragged to the Cross Prison without explanation.
After Catwhisker finished speaking, he shrugged and left as if he had made a bad joke. Du Yu glanced at her but didn't care where Catwhisker, the mist hunter from the lower city, knew about this prison, which supposedly had no prisoners who ever came out alive.
So the difficult task of entering the Upper City was broken down into three simple steps: commit a crime, get arrested, and then wait to be transported to prison.
Of course, there are rules about what kind of things you do. As we all know, Quark Pharmaceuticals and Lange Communications were the two financial groups that suffered the most damage and hated the rebel army the most. Quark is still embroiled in the turmoil caused by Bian Shaoyan's death.
Du Yu was 90% certain that as long as he committed some act related to the rebels, he could successfully infiltrate Lange Communications' territory. Without the obstructing spirit barrier, Du Yu's actions wouldn't be as restricted as they were now.
Coincidentally, Du Yu happened to have the offspring of a certain rebel leader, so everything was ready except for going to jail.
Standing to the side, Cai Chunyu watched as Cat Whiskers enthusiastically introduced Du Yu to which canteen at the Cross Prison had the best food, and then watched Bishop D diligently taking notes, trying to prepare for his imprisonment. A sense of helplessness welled up in her heart.
This sense of powerlessness often lingered around her when she was the unreliable vice-captain, Cat Whiskers.
Who would have thought that they would stray into a cult, adding another even more unreliable person to their ranks?
Is going to jail a good thing?! Why are you so excited, like you're going on a picnic?!
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Author's Note: *Information about the white jade snail comes from Baidu.
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